


A Reminder

by goodnightmoonz



Category: Avatar: The Last Airbender
Genre: Book 2 Divergence, F/M, Fairy Tale Elements, Fairy Tale Retellings, Gen, Introspection, Katara's Necklace, Necklaces, just an emo boy being emo
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-12-22
Updated: 2020-12-22
Packaged: 2021-03-11 02:02:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,689
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28237380
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/goodnightmoonz/pseuds/goodnightmoonz
Summary: There is something about this girl, who dresses in blue rags and spits at his feet, who looks at him with such fire he feels as if he will burn. There is nothing soft in her yet when he brushed her neck it felt like he was touching a cloud. When his fist wrapped around her necklace the memory of the touch refused to fade away.
Relationships: Katara/Zuko (Avatar)
Comments: 2
Kudos: 21
Collections: Zutara Holiday Exchange 2020





	A Reminder

**Author's Note:**

  * For [idontreadheartbeats](https://archiveofourown.org/users/idontreadheartbeats/gifts).



> Happy Holiday! And I hope you are staying safe and warm! Here is your gift fic, I hope you enjoy it!
> 
> I know you asked for season one Zuko and I just got carried away! So I hope you like this, which really isn't what you asked for, but there is still all about the necklace! Anyway, don't kill me! I am a slave to my dumb thoughts! Hope you enjoy it!

Ursa was a fantastic storyteller, she would weave worlds with words leaving him dreaming of dragons and spirits night after night. Ursa would sit them down in Zuko’s room dismissing their maids for the night, tucking them into the covers. She smelled like fire-lilies and tea, he hopes he will never forget that smell even if he starts to forget her face. 

He loved the stories where the hero got to live happily ever after. While his sister on the other hand loved the ones where the characters suffered where they got tragedy instead of joy.

That should have raised alarm bells at the time as to the nature of this little girl but it didn’t. Blame it on neglect or hubris; it doesn't matter if the result is the same. A monster of a girl, one ensnared in her own mind.

One of Azula’s favorites that Zuko despised was of a man who fell in love with a princess, defining all laws to be with her in the name of love. Simple enough premise, not particularly surprising a young girl would gush over such a tale. But it was not so.

_The enchanting Princess did not love the man back, not at all. In fact, the Princess herself was cruel and heartless, nothing like the caring and generous woman the peasant thought her to be._

_With her betrothed, a fellow royal, they would toy with this peasant. Send him after objects thought unobtainable; a scale of a dragon, water from a spirit oasis, a horn of a flying bison, whisker of a great badgermole._

_To make it even harsher with a kind smile she would give him no time at all to find such items, a day or two at most. But each time he would kneel blooded and bruised before the Princess holding the objects in his hands, pledging his love to her. That even though he was a poor farmer without any bending, he would move mountains for her. For that is how much he loved her._

_The Princess didn’t like this, not that she grew a conscience and started pitying the poor man, but that she was getting bored. No longer did seeing the man broken and graveling amuse her so she stopped accepting him._

_The farmer was blocked from the castle, no longer allowed in. Confused he was by this, knowing the Princess loved him and he has proved his devotion to her in gathering her beloved objects. There must be a mistake._

_But the guards just laughed at him when he insisted he was wanted, he would be missed, he was loved by the Princess. After the laughter died the guards would look at him with a pitying stare, knowing he did not know. That he truly believes the sinister Princess capable of love and to him of all people._

_They allowed him a glimpse in the castle walls to where the Princess sat in the castle garden closer than any friends would be with her betrothed. They held hands as they pulled at flowers and kicked the water of the pound disturbing the little turtleducks. The guards told him how the Princess was engaged to this man, a Prince of another kingdom. That he was as cruel as her, they made quite a pair._

_The man shook his head in disbelief not believing what he was seeing or hearing. The Princess loved him, she had too. When she looked at him he swore he saw love shining in her eyes. But often is the line between hate and love is blurred to naive eyes._

Azula always without fail falls asleep at this point. Thinking the story ends with the Princess humiliating the man who is beneath her, winning the day. But Ursa keeps the story going, letting her daughter rest.

_He fled from the castle running as far as his legs would take him until he found himself in a place he has never seen before. It was a garden of sorts with glowing flowers and soft grass and in the middle was a shining pond. He neared it and saw his tear-stained face reflected back at him, he covered his face in his hands._

_After a moment he feels a small pressure and sees a petite eel-swan nibbling at his hands. He smiles at the animal and offers it a piece of bread from his bag. The eel-swan gratefully takes it and the man smiles again. For some odd reason, the man feels a compulsion to share his woes with the animal._

_Once his tale is complete as bright light overtakes his eyes, he has to shield them against it. When his vision returns to him gone is the eel-swan. Now there is a small boy with rosy cheeks, impossibly floating above the surface of the water._

_Before the man can find his voice the boy conjures up a necklace out of thin air, it has dazzling jewels a man like him can’t even name. It looks like it is worth more than his life._

_The boy holds the object in front of the man’s face, the peasant’s eyes memorized by the refraction of light off the jewels._

_The boy smiles at him and tells him the necklace could fix his problems if he just gets his beloved to wear the necklace and she will be his forever and always. That she will love him to the end of time. That she will follow his every command and make the perfect wife and mother. Be that girl he thought she was._

_The man cautiously eyes the boy, untrusting but he swipes the necklace away from him, not wanting this chance to go to waste. A question is on his lips as the boy adds an ultimatum. That if he fails to get her to wear the jewelry by the end of the night a curse will be placed on him._

_Before the man has a chance to ask anything the boy is gone and he is left alone with the glittering necklace. One last task for her love._

_There is no moon that night, only the stars are his company as he sneaks his way into the castle. It is surprisingly easy for him to make his way to the garden where she sits pulling up grass in handfuls. He makes his way over to her slowly, careful not to make a noise._

_He sees her hair undone for the first time. It is loose in beautiful golden waves down her back, her green eyes reflect the night sky, her lips are plump and red, ready for him._

_He holds the necklace open in his hand, just one more step and it will be on her. Then she will be his forever like it is supposed to be._

_But she turns around suddenly, eyes wide with shock until she recognizes him. The look he once thought of as love crosses her face but now he recognizes it as something else entirely._

_She stares him down, no fear across her face, knowing she can control him as easily as a predator with its prey. No longer finding him entertaining, done with her game, she asks him what he wants from her. Her body? Her money? A claim to the throne?_

_He hides the necklace behind his back and denies all this. Telling her he has no wish to be King or rich. That all he ever wanted was her, from the first day he laid eyes on her he felt as if an arrow shot through his chest. That looking at her was like looking at the sun, that even when he closed his eyes he still saw her light._

_He wished for nothing more than to marry her and live on his small farm making a family for themselves. Having little golden-haired children that he would love like nothing in this world, lying each night in her embrace, telling her stories that would make her emerald eyes sparkle with joy. That would be paradise, not fame or wealth. Just her._

_She stares at him wide-eyed with shock not knowing what to say. She knows her fiancé would never say such words to her, that to him she is just a Princess. Just a prize or object._

_The kindest thing the Prince ever told her was she had ‘exotic’ hair, never before seeing the color. She doesn’t think such words as the farmer proclaim are in his vocabulary._

_Her mouth is open, still unable to say anything. The man pleads with her to give him a chance, that they started wrong. Never giving each other enough time to get to know one another, to just talk, not run after a quest. He insists that no matter what the people say about her that she is a good person._

_He looks down at his necklace, knowing it would be wrong to turn her into his slave. A person without any opinions or words, that she wouldn’t be the same person he knows. He stuffs the necklace away and approaches her._

_As he nears her, she doesn’t push away, finally seeing him for the first time. He pushes a fair lock of hair behind her ear, his weathered hand touching her soft skin. He is so different from her, with dark eyes, hair, and skin. With calloused hands and tough skin weathered by the sun. But she knows she can love him, that she already feels it forming._

_She leans into his touch as he nears her mouth, just a breath away. They stare into each other’s eyes, locked until her emerald eyes see something._

_“Look,” she points to the horizon, “it’s the sun.”_

_He turns pale, his pocket seems to burn, his knees give out. She grips his hands and asks what is wrong._

_He gives her a tight-lipped smile, “I’m sorry, my love. If only we had more time.”_

_Tears start to fall from her eyes as the light drains from his honey eyes. She hugs him as he fades away. She cries as the sun finds his place in the sky, gripping his body for life._

_Then there is pressure on her back, something pulling her off. Her breath stops and she looks to the farmer, grateful to the spirits. But when she grabs his face and looks into his brown eyes she sees nothing._

_Not that overwhelming sense of love and devotion, not even recognition. He pulls away from her, his eyes lifeless._

_When he stands he says nothing. When she holds his wrist and questions him with concern, he stares at her blankly. He tugs his arm away and turns away. She chases after him and apologizes for everything, that she was just a hurt girl taking it out on anyone. That she feels that she can love him if given the chance._

_He pushed her off, disgust was written across his face, “I’m sorry but I don’t know you,” tears are falling from her eyes, “I have to go.”_

_She collapses to the ground, tears falling from her eyes. Her hand finds something in the grass, she picks it up and sees through her tears that it is a necklace. What was once gold and jeweled is now tarnished and ruined._

_But for some reason, she can’t depart with it as she attaches it to her wrist and watches his figure disappear._

Ursa ends the story there but Zuko with open eyes asks what happened to the farmer and Princess. Ursa with a fond smile tells her son that the Princess went on to become the Queen never once getting married, that she never once again let anyone in her heart. And that the farmer lived a simple life with a wife and many children, never once thinking of the golden-haired Princess.

Zuko frowns at this, “But why? If he loved her so much why did he forget her?”

Ursa fixes a hair that is falling in a sleeping Azula’s mouth, “He did, sweetie. But since he failed to put the necklace on her gifted to him by the spirit he was cursed with forgetting her and erasing any possibility of him loving her again.”

The young Prince loudly huffs, Ursa places a finger on her lips not wanting him to wake his sister. He then whispers, “Why didn’t he just put the necklace on her then?”

Ursa smiles at her son, “If he did that then she wouldn’t have been the woman he loved, she would have been a slave.”

Zuko nods to this knowing how wrong that would be, he would never force someone to love him.

“I hate that story,” Zuko says, crossing his little arms. 

Ursa laughs silently and ruffles his hair, “I know. But your sister loves it even though it always puts her asleep.”

She grabs Azula carefully in her arms and runs a hand over Zuko’s face. She extinguishes the light by his bed and gives him one last kiss on the cheek, “Goodnight, Zuko. Sleep well.”

Just as she makes it to the doorway Zuko asks in a small voice, “Mom, there is still one thing I don’t get.” He frowns against his blankets, “Why did the Princess keep the necklace?”

The mother whispers carefully not to awake her daughter, “I guess as a punishment of what she could have had if she acted differently.” Her face darkens with some emotion, “As a constant reminder of a love lost. There is nothing more painful than that.”

* * *

Zuko is sixteen, almost seventeen, on the open seas when he finally understands his mother’s words.

He stands with his face facing the open, water droplets clinging to his scar, hands behind his back. Clad in black and red armor, standing straight as possible as he watches the sun disappear in the dusk. The moon is visible now, he feels himself growing tired.

He knows for her it is the exact opposite wherever she is. His wrist feels heavy as if in tandem with his thoughts.

Her necklace burns on his wrist; the blue so at odds with his reds, that it has to be a metaphor for something.

Throughout wearing the necklace he notices how it is always cold, the stone absorbing cold like water does lighting. He wonders how she can stand wearing it so long. (But that is hypocritical, he has worn the same necklace for months now.)

But he knows if he had something of his mother’s he will never let it go. He wonders how angry she is at him.

If her eyes have that fire that seems so at odds in her sapphire oasis yet so at home. He is used to that look by her. That anger overtakes any emotion as they knock fire against water in powerful streams. 

He recoils at that memory; of his choice. He hasn’t even stepped foot in his long-awaited home and he regrets it. Azula is always miles ahead and he is left in her dust.

He felt heat pulsing off her neck as he was this close to finally, after many long months, returning her necklace to its rightful place. But then his Uncle and the Avatar choose that time to break in, jolting them apart. 

He remembers seeing an emotion other than hate and anger in her eyes; something that blurred a line. 

Then she no longer just his as the Avatar pulled her into a hug. Then whatever that emotion was gone as he shot a ball of flame at the Avatar. Her necklace back on his wrist.

His Uncle once asked him, while he was still Lee, why he wore the necklace. He looked away from his Uncle, flustered. Coming up with the answer that he didn’t want to lose it.

Uncle just smirked at his Nephew and offered him comfort in the only way he knew; tea. 

But now as Zuko stands facing the moon, it’s light bathing him in silver, he knows he wears it now for a different reason.

As a constant reminder of a love lost, there is nothing more painful than that.

**Author's Note:**

> Bloop! I hope you liked this introspective mess! Happy Holidays!


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